181 posts from June 2012

June 29, 2012

The Plesner Committee, tasked with creating a replacement for the Tal Law, which effectively allowed haredim to dodge the draft but which was ruled unconstitutional by Israel’s High Court of Justice in February, has developed a plan for haredi army service based the Hesder Yeshiva Program used by most Zionist Orthodox youth.

A source tells me that Empire kosher Poultry is buying MVP, the company that owns the Mehadrin Kosher Poultry brand. Empire is allegedly closing the Mehadrin slaughterhouse, moving Mehadrin's production to Empire's existing facilities, and laying off all the employees – including shochtim and mashgichim. Is it true?

"The Jewish Week’s coverage encouraged abuse victims to come forward and spurred mainstream media outlets into action. The judges praised the series for sending a message to ethnic media to be unafraid to air and take on problems in their own communities."

Rabbi Shlomo Brody, a Harvard grad who is the online editor of the Modern Orthodox journal Tradition and a teacher at Yeshivat Hakotel in Jerusalem, lies about Jewish law's position on breaking Shabbat law in order to save the life of a gentile.

“There isn’t a single e-mail, a single letter, a single memo, either originating from the D.A.’s office or addressed to it, that so much as mentions any attempt by the D.A. to seek a change in the extradition treaty,” Mr. Lesher said. “It’s just inconceivable that such important negotiation on such a detailed issue could have taken place and not left a trace in the documentary record.”

"One of the matters the rebbe wishes to place an emphasis on is non-kosher cellular phones, telling his rabbonim that if an avreich is apprehended with a “treif phone” they are empowered to break the phone, to smash it and they will not be liable for damages. One of the more extreme rulings being reported in the rebbe’s name is that if they find a treif phone hidden somewhere in the yeshiva they may even take it on shabbos and smash it, explaining the reality necessitates chilul shabbos."

"[For Haredim], reality isn’t reality. If Haredim say the sky is green and the grass under their feet is blue, then so it is. And any attempt by non-Haredim to point out or change these errors will be met with a giant Haredi farting sound followed by a prolonged, violence-filled tantrum."

When Avrohom Mondrowitz was arrested in Jerusalem in 2007 in reaction to an Ha'aretz two-part exposé on him material of a criminal nature was on Mondrowitz's hard drive – something police had known for months prior but had made no attempt to deal with. What was really on Mondrowitz's hard drive? In part, this…

Avrohom Mondrowitz, a hasidic man who pretended to be a therapist for troubled youth and used that position to allegedly rape more than 100 boys, fled an indictment for raping children in Brooklyn a quarter century ago. Living openly in Israel for more than a quarter century, Mondrowitz was caught with child porn on his computer in Jerusalem. Also on that computer was proof that Mondrowitz runs several fake universities that award fake diplomas. Even so, it appears that Mondrowitz is working with the Israeli haredi city of Bnei Brak to counsel its troubled children.

Guma Aguiar is still missing, presumably drowned at sea. The multimillionaire is a major donor to Chabad and to Israeli causes. A large chunk of his assets seem to have been dissipated before he disappeared. And now his mother and his wife – who told Aguiar just before he disappeared that she wanted a divorce – are fighting for control of what is left of the oil and gas millionaire's fortune.

"Forget about it, because there is no chance whatsoever that any kind of yeshiva boy will be heading to the draft office the day Israel’s government announces a haredi draft. It won’t happen, and we can assume that you too, deep in your heart, are aware of this fact. Let us be, because maybe the time has come to discover that you have no chance to contend with people whose agents of influence and cultural icons – that is, the rabbis – view enlistment as a colossal disaster and make it clear that this is simply unacceptable."

Hasidic rabbis had an emergency meeting with an attorney last night in Williamsburg to discuss what is about to be a crisis over metzitzah b'peh (MBP) the direct oral-to genital sucking done by the mohel to the baby's bleeding penis just after the circumcision is completed. MBP is primarily confined to hasidic circumcisions. MBP can kill babies. (At least 2 have died from MBP-transmitted Herpes in NYC over the past 11 years alone.) More frequently it causes brain damage or otherwise sickens them. Another baby now lies hospitalized with a Herpes infection from MBP, and the rabbis realize that MBP may be about to be banned or, as some hasidim think, the government will mandate that all circumcisions with or without MBP be done in a sterile hospital setting.

June 27, 2012

Listening to what former Brooklyn D.A. Liz Holtzman said about the notorious fugitive from justice Avrohom Mondrowitz on Zev Brenner's show last night caused me to think in some detail about the failed attempts to extradite him.

A former member of the Jewish Shomrim street patrol/neighborhood watch group won’t serve a day in prison for beating a black teen in 2010. The teen was walking through a heavily Jewish Baltimore neighborhood when he was stopped and assaulted.

U.S. Rep. Nydia Velazquez easily won the Democratic primary in her redrawn district yesterday, with a vote total that was 27 percentage points greater than her nearest challenger, City Councilman Erik Martin Dilan. Dilan was backed by the Williamsburg Satmar Rebbe Zaman Teitelbaum. Rabbi David Niederman, the head of United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg (UJO) and a Zalman backer, allegedly formed a shell organization and used it to produce promotional information backing and to campaign for Dilan.

Liz Holtzman talks about her hunt for Avrohom Mondrowitz, who fled Brooklyn with the help and encouragement of rabbis just before being indicted for raping boys. Mondrowitz has lived safely and openly in Israel for more than 25 years as Israel repeatedly refused to extradite him – something Holtzman believes shames Israel.

At a meeting called by the Israel's chief rabbis to find ways to block non-Orthodox rabbis from being paid by and recognized by the state, more than 200 rabbis – almost all haredi – omit the standard prayer for the welfare of the State of Israel and fail to sing the national anthem.

Brooklyn D.A. Charles Hynes' alleged kid gloves treatment of haredi criminals was questioned at least as far back as 1994, when America's leading newspaper criticized Hynes for going way too easy on haredi criminals.

Washington appellate attorney Nathan Lewin has filed a defamation suit in the Beit Din of America against the American Jewish World (AJW) on behalf of AER Services, Inc. and Triangle-K kosher supervision over the paper's coverage of the Hebrew National scandal.

Twenty-four-year-old Eliyahu Werdesheim faces sentencing tomorrow for second-degree assault and false imprisonment after being convicted of beating a black teen who was walking through a heavily Jewish Baltimore neighborhood. But prosecutors now say they won't seek prison time for the crime.

Magen David Adom (MDA), Israel’s version of the Red Cross, buckled to pressure from haredim and from haredi-leaning Zionist Orthodox rabbis and appointed a rabbinic committee to set up and enforce religious guidelines and gender segregation rules for the paramedic and disaster response service.

June 25, 2012

A haredi woman gave birth while home alone on Shabbat morning as her husband prayed in a Jerusalem synagogue. But instead of going to a hospital she hid the baby under her dress, umbilical cord still intact, and hid the placenta in a bag placed next to her. She refused to speak or communicate – even to call an ambulance – because she had taken a vow to designate the day a ta’anit dibur, a “fast day” for speaking.

Almost two weeks ago, two newspaper executives filed complaints at an Israeli police station. Each accused the other of assault. One is Rabbi Yaakov Labin, the outgoing director of the non-hasidic Ashkenazi haredi newspaper Yated Ne’eman. The other is Yated Ne’eman’s new director, Shimon Glick. The two allegedly fought over control of the haredi mouthpiece at its offices in Bnei Brak.

A tow-truck driver delivered a Jewish baby yesterday when the baby’s father, an Orthodox Jew, wouldn’t touch his wife for "religious reasons" and instead stood on an East Harlem street and tried to flag down passing drivers.

Haredim are geographically part of Israel but often act as if their only connection to the state they live in are the social services and welfare handouts they expect and demand from it. What can a secular society do to deal with a rapidly growing minority within it that refuses to bear the burdens of having a state, while at the same looting that state's coffers?

5,000 haredim crowded the streets of Jerusalem’s Mea Shearim neighborhood at 5:00 a.m. this morning to participate in a mass prayer rally against government plans to draft haredim into the army or compel them to do a period of national service. Haredim wore sackcloth, smeared ash on their heads, and recited penitential prayers known as shlichot – all signs of mourning and repentance.

June 24, 2012

Merkin put $2 billion of his clients’ money in the care of Bernard Madoff, and deceiving investors by concealing Madoff’s role in managing their money. Merkin did that in part by releasing misleading documents, including quarterly reports.

Aguiar’s wife Jamie is also suing him over the couple's prenup, which would only give her $500,000 in the event of a divorce. Jamie claims the agreement is fraudulent because Aguiar knew when they were married in 2005 that he was worth hundreds of millions of dollars, but he hid that fact from her.

"Isn’t it amazing what the glare of a news- media spotlight can do? Brooklyn DA Joe Hynes — who’s been under fire for years over his questionable handling of child-sex-abuse cases involving the Orthodox Jewish community — has finally seen fit to file charges of witness intimidation.…Little steps for little feet, Mr. DA. But keep it up."

The Conservative Movement's Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS) puts pashkvils, wall posters, up in Ramat Beit Shemesh in the 'extremist' haredi neighborhood where the spate of anti-secular, anti-Modern Orthodox violence in the city has originated. But these haredim don't know what JTS is – just like they don't know what Santa Claus is and therefore dress some of their children as Santa every Purim, because Santa costumes are Christmas remnants and therefore cheap. So the pashkvils remain posted – and haredim remain oblivious.

Haredi businessman Hershy Friedman bought Agriprocessors' assets “free and clear” of liability in 2009. The county sued in 2010, claiming that Friedman's company owed approximately $500,000 in taxes for the 2007-2008 tax year that were not paid by Agriprocessors. Friedman's company pointed to the “free and clear” ruling and said it owed nothing. But in January 2012, the same judge who allowed Friedman's company to buy Agriprocessors "free and clear" of all liabilities found that Friedman's company knew about the unpaid tax bill then but hid its existence from the court. Therefore, the judge ruled, Friedman's company was “not a good faith purchaser” and the county still was owed the money.

The haredi news website Behadrei Haredim posted an ABC 7 New York video about the heatwave engulfing the city. But it blacks out the chests of the female reporter and the female news anchor who report the story.

Rabbi Yehuda Kolko, a haredi teacher and camp counselor with a long history of alleged child sexual abuse covering four decades, escaped a prison sentence in 2008 when Brooklyn’s ethically challenged District Attorney Charles Hynes gave Kolko what some observers say was the sweetheart plea deal of the decade. But now he may go to prison because of the courage of a 13-year-old boy.

June 22, 2012

Goodman pleaded guilty to multiple felonies, including oral sex and anal sex with the victim. He could have been sentenced to dozens of years in prison. Instead, Judge Martin P. Murphy refused to allow the victim's parent or the A.D.A. to speak, and instead sentenced Goodman to 2 years in prison followed by 10 years of supervised release. With time already served, Goodman will be free in September. Goodman is a former Ohel employee.

Failed messiah was established and run in 2004 by Mr. Shmarya (Scott)Rosenberg. The site was acquired by Diversified Holdings, Feb 2016. .We thank Mr. Rosenberg for his efforts on behalf of the Jewish Community.

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